Harvest Moon

Corn Moon · Barley Moon

The only moon named after the sky rather than the land. The harvest moon is, by definition, the full moon nearest the autumn equinox, most often September’s. Every farming tradition of the northern hemisphere knows it under some name: barley moon, corn moon, moon of the grape harvest.

It was said that around the equinox, the angle between the moon’s path and the horizon flattens. For several evenings running, the moon rises at almost the same hour, just after sunset. Before machines, the harvesters finished their fields by its light. The name tells an astronomer’s truth as much as a farmer’s.

Around the equinox, the moon rises barely twenty minutes later from one evening to the next, against fifty on average. That is the real secret of the harvest moon.